Clare Island Survey — Agriculture and its History. 5 39 



Arthur Young came to Ireland ; but that writer saw it only in one or two 

 places in Ireland. He mentions that Lord Shelbourne, at Eathan, in Queen's 

 County, had a Norfolk bailiff " who brought with him a plowman, plough, 

 harrow and tackle " ; ' he describes Mr. Bushe's farming at Kilfaine, in Kil- 

 kenny, and says " this is the Norfolk husbandry " ; 2 and at Castle Martyr, in 

 Cork, he found a man who had adopted it only to give it up again : " Lord 

 Shannon's expression of this mode to me was excellent, / read myself into 

 it and worked myself out of it. He tried it with wheat, horse and hand-hoeing 

 it perfectly, and got a very fine crop ; an unexceptionable one for the mode, 

 but the practice was not equal to the common way, while the expense, 

 trouble, and attention, were endless, so that he was convinced, even by his 

 success, that it could not be a beneficial mode of culture. For turneps also 

 he prefers very much the broad-cast mode, and never began the drill method 

 but as an ease of hoeing." 3 



But all over Ireland, in Young's time, and even in Wakefield's time, the 

 rotations were generally copies or modifications either of the old three-field 

 system or of the " inclosed " systems of cropping in England or Scotland. A 

 few samples from Young will indicate this. Let us take the Pale counties 

 first : — 



At Luttrell's Tmcn, 1 Co. Dublin, the rotation was fallow, wheat, oats ; 

 but " sometimes 1 Fallow. 2 Wheat. 3 Oats. 4 Clover. 5 Wheat. 6 Oats. 

 They plough four times for wheat, 5 on clover but once, feed their clover the 

 year through. ■ No sain-foine. Many potatoes in the ridgeway 7 feet broad, 

 and the furrows 3|." 6 



At Celbridge, Co. Kildare : Fallow, wheat, oats, oats. " A little barley is 

 cidtivated. They plough three or four times for wheat. Turneps were sown 

 in fields 30 years ago, but left off on account of the poor stealing them."' 



At Slane, Co. Meath: Fallow, wheat, barley or oats, oats. "Also 1 Fallow, 

 2 wheat, 3 barley, 4 oats, 5 clover, for Two years, 6 Barley." 6 



At Athy, Co. Kildare, " the common course of crops " was " 1 Fallow. 

 2 Wheat, yielding 7 to 9 barrels. 3 Barley, 15 barrels. 4 Oats, 15 to 20. 



5 Left for grass." 9 



From Athy to Carton-, " the courses are : 1 Fallow. 2 Wheat, yielding 5 or 



6 barrels. Also 1 Fallow. 2 Wheat. 3 Oats, and grass seeds, or left to turf 

 itself." 10 



In louth : 1 Fallow, 2 Wheat, 3 Oats, 4 Barley, 5 Oats, 6 " Grass seeds 

 sown, or left waste to turf itself." 11 



1 Tour in Ireland, Hutton's edition, vol. i, p. 65. - Ibid., p. 79. 3 Ibid., p. 323. 



4 Now called Woodlands. 5 i.e. they plough the fallow four times. 



6 Young, Huttcm's edition, vol. i, p. 22. 7 Ibid., vol. i, p. 27. 9 Ibid., vol. i, p. 37. 



9 Ibid., i, p. 71. 10 Ibid., i, p. 71. » Ibid., i, p. 113. 



